Child abuse by the numbers

Child abuse by the numbers

Herald-Dispatch, Huntington, W. Va.: Combating child abuse is a tricky proposition.

Too often, it’s not known what goes on inside a household and whether children are abused behind the closed doors. Or whether the abuse is physical in nature, a matter of neglect, or of the psychological variety.

What is clear is that reducing the amount of suffering children experience at the hands of adults is a never-ending battle that warrants the fullest attention of all of us, but particularly those with the authority to do something about it.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services revealed that reported cases of child abuse and neglect dropped nationwide for the fifth consecutive year. The decline wasn’t much -- about 2 percent -- but the number was headed in a positive direction.

However, as officials noted, the total cases reported last year, 681,000, means that there are still hundreds of thousands of children across the nation who need help. A further breakdown of the numbers by state indicates that West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio have plenty of work to do.

The federal agency’s annual report showed that West Virginia had the nation’s highest rate of child fatalities in 2011, at 4.16 per 100,000 children in the state. Sixteen children were reported to have died from abuse, double the number of fatalities in 2010 in the Mountain State. Kentucky had the seventh highest rate, while Ohio’s was 15th highest.